Gary Pasternack, MD, PhD is Chief Executive Officer of Asklepion Pharmaceuticals. He is a seasoned biotech executive with a history of identifying opportunities for challenging, innovative technologies and driving them to product stage and commercialization. As one example, he is a co-founder of Intralytix where he identified food safety opportunities for bacteriophages, obtained initial funding for the company, and helped the company obtain FDA approval for its initial products involving the application of bacteriophages (live viruses) to food to eliminate food-borne bacterial pathogens.
Most recently, after joining Asklepion in 2008, he led Asklepion’s successful efforts to obtain FDA and EMA approval for Cholbam® (cholic acid) in the US and Kolbam® (cholic acid) in the EU based principally upon retrospective studies of patients with inborn errors of bile acid metabolism, earning a Rare Pediatric Disease Priority Review Voucher from the FDA. Dr. Pasternack is a board-certified pathologist who maintains an adjunct academic appointment at his alma mater, Johns Hopkins. He is an inventor on 29 issued US patents.